Congdon et al., 2007:

"Within tropical, subtropical and temperate Australasia, significant impacts on seabird biology have been linked primarily to fluctuations in the ENSO. In Western Australian colonies, sensitivity to oceanographic conditions during ENSO years has resulted in delayed breeding and poor breeding success in wedgetailed shearwaters and poor foraging returns for at least three of four tropical tern species (Table 14.1). At these colonies the number of active wedge-tailed shearwater burrows excavated per season directly reflected fluctuations in ENSO and oceanographic conditions from previous years: there being a significant correlation between the three-year running mean in active burrow numbers and the annual Southern Oscillation Index over the same period³³. In temperate eastern Australasia during the 2002 ENSO event, sooty terns at Lord Howe Island experienced almost complete breeding failure, with virtually all chicks that hatched dying of starvation (L. O’Neill pers comm). This reproductive crash followed a non-ENSO year with approximately 99 percent fledging success.

Large-scale ENSO processes have also been associated with negative impacts on tropical seabird breeding success in the Coral Sea and along the northeast Australian coastline, especially for colonies on or adjacent to the GBR (Figure 14.1). Such impacts have been particularly obvious during events like the 1997 and 1998 ENSO. Extremely high sea surface temperature increases during this event were also accompanied by severe reef-wide coral bleaching^55,10."

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Citation and/or URL

Congdon, B.C., Erwin, C.A., Peck, D.R., Baker, B.G., Double, M.C. & O'Neill, P. 2007, Vulnerability of seabirds on the Great Barrier Reef to climate change, In Climate change and the Great Barrier Reef: A Vulnerability Assessment, eds. J.E. Johnson & P.A. Marshall, Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority and Australian Greenhouse Office, Townsville, Qld, 427-463

www.gbrmpa.gov.au/corp_site/info_services/publications/misc_pub/climate_change_vulnerability_assessment/climate_change_vulnerability_assessment

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